


Love's not Time's fool

by Green_Demoness



Category: Hamlet - Shakespeare
Genre: Bathtubs, But slightly NSFW, I'm Bad At Tagging, Kissing, M/M, Male Slash, Poetry, Weird Treasures, not really smut, skull
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-06-05
Updated: 2018-06-05
Packaged: 2019-05-18 10:59:51
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,463
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14851472
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Green_Demoness/pseuds/Green_Demoness
Summary: After a servant find a skull in Hamlet's room, Horatio needs to talk with Hamlet about treasure things, however Hamlet is more interested in the loving, although full of doubts man in his front...





	Love's not Time's fool

**Author's Note:**

> This scene is placed after the Act V, scene 1
> 
> My HC of Horatio as someone fearful of rejection refuses to leave me...
> 
> Dear reader, English is not my first, so feel free to point out any mistake =)

 

* * *

     A sharp scream comes from Hamlet’s bedroom, but the voice belonged to one of castle’s servants. Horatio enters the room, with the crying woman at his back, pointing to a shelf. Amidst some books, there was a skull half smiling to whoever entered the place. He had seen that skull before. It was Yorick’s. He sighs, feeling a little shocked by the fact the prince had unearthed it again. There was nothing he could do to alter whatever passed through that woman’s mind, but he still could talk with his lord to put such unsightly thing in a more secretive place.

    The scent of lavender filled the place and steam floated in the air. Hamlet was underwater, laying at the bottom of the tub, holding his breath the longest he can. The absence of sound amazed him as if the whole world had turned mute. But the lack of oxygen urged him to go back to the surface where his eyes met Horatio’s confused ones.

     - My Lord… What are you…

    - Nothing, Horatio, just having a bit of silence.

    - I think - looking at Hamlet’s naked figure - My matter can wait you finish.

    - No, stay! There’s no need to be shy, Horatio!

    Horatio sighs and blushes. That was going to be a long talk. He sits on the border of a window, waiting the right moment to bring up the skull into the conversation. After some minutes listening at Hamlet’s thoughts about the stars, he discovered that such moment would never exist or, at least, comes in time to avoid another person from finding Yorick’s remains.

    - My lord... The skull in your room...

    - Yorick’s skull. I talked with the gravedigger, and he let me have it.

    - But, if I may ask, why would you keep it?

    - Pretty simple, Horatio. Do you remember when I ask you if Alexander, the Great’s skull could end up filling wall holes? Do you remember your answer?

    - I do, my lord. Even the most important men in life can end up being mortar in death - trying to recuperate the accusation tone - But I cannot see how this related to the jester skull.

    - Oh, Horatio, how can your eyes be so clear and so blind? Don’t people treasure precious things, even if they worth nothing?

    Once again, Horatio feels cornered by Hamlet’s words. He knew the Hamlet’s affection for the jester, that was his truly fatherly figure when the king was too absorbed in the kingdom’s problems. However, he could not let the gossips about Hamlet’s madness gain more strength.

    - My lord, I understand you want to honor your memories of Yorick, but are you sure you must keep that where unaware eyes can fall upon?

    - Do you want me to create an altar to it, Horatio?

    - My lord, one of the servants saw it and run away from your room. Please, I beg you to place where your heart desire, but away from other’s eyes!

    - What do you implore? - approaching the edge of the tub - Come forward, Horatio, I am unsure if I had heard well...

    Unaware, Horatio sits over the brink of the tub, just to have Hamlet pulling him inside the water. He scrambles as the water starts to fill his lungs, trying to escape from Hamlet’s arms. The prince starts to laughs as Horatio goes to the other side of the tub.

    - My lord, you.. Why.. my God! 

\- My Horatio - advancing like a cat at Horatio’s direction - How you dare to ask such thing? I am the majesty over here and if I decide to keep a whole skeleton in my bed, I will. Did you understand me?

    - I… I am sorry, my lord - realizing he got caught in the spider’s web - You are right. I am just…

    - Shh, don’t low yourself to the level of those noblemen who crawls in the court - touching Horatio’s thigh - I know you do this because you care about me or about what people say about me.

    The prince’s touch was almost unbearable to Horatio. Any sense of fighting off the hands of the other man or even getting out of the tub disappeared in the moment he met Hamlet’s eyes. Those green eyes could capture the soul of a man and treasure it like Yorick’s skull. Horatio closes his eyes as the prince tried taking his wet clothes off. Oh, he felt so weak as he was under a spell. His face burned with shyness and his heart burned with passion. Horatio feels Hamlet’s lips ghosting his own, then whispering into his ear. _“I am not made of marble, Horatio, and I don’t like seeing an honored man imploring for anything.”_ Hamlet bites Horatio neck, sending a shiver down his spine. _“I will put it in a chest, surrounded by gold and flowers”._ Then, he put their foreheads together, touching their noses.

     - Horatio, if I die before you, do you promise you will not let me become a barrel stopper?

     - My lord, don’t ever say such a thing!

     - Swear it, Horatio.

    Hamlets lets himself sit on Horatio’s lap. Again, he ghosts his lips over Horatio’s, but pull back when the other tried to retribute the kiss. He places a hand on his chest, looking firmly in Horatio’s eyes.

    - First, swear it, my good Horatio.

    - I do, my lord. If such horrible and unthinkable scenario ever happen, I swear will never let your remains be transformed in dust and be devoured away by the earth.

    - Excellent answer - cupping Horatio’s face and kissing him.

    Horatio knows that Hamlet’s influence over him was like the stream that bring the water down the river. It was not something he could ever fight. _Well, he did not want to._ The lightest touch set fire inside him. Burning high and burning hot. Sometimes, he wondered when or where this fire would end. Sometimes, the possible answers scared him. Then he holds Hamlet in his arms, letting the prince ward off those doubts.

    Although Horatio was always powerless to Hamlet’s desires, the prince was never a tyrant on his love. They completed each other. The sun and the moon. The night and the day. Summer and winter. Though, those elements are perfectly equal, they were also known to never be together. That pained Horatio the most. One day, King Claudius would die, by Hamlet’s hand or not, and Hamlet shall be the new king. Horatio wondered if their love would stay the same. A throne requires an heir. A throne requires a sharp mind and a cold heart. A throne shuns the love of a man. Horatio’s eyes fill up with tears. Hamlet feels the trembling of his lover and ceases kissing Horatio.

    - What’s wrong, my beloved? Did I said something that wounded you?

    - Never, my lord, you are Love in an earthly body. It’s… nothing you should mind.

    - How nothing? My dear shed those sad tears and I should not worry? What troubles you, Horatio?

    - Love.

    - Love?

    - If tomorrow’s love will be the same of this one which blossom now.

    Hamlets pulls Horatio over him, laying the man over his chest, fondling his hair. Hamlet’s mind revolves in search of a word, of a sentence which could cast away those forlorn feelings out of him. A word connects to another and so on, forming a golden tapestry inside Hamlet's mind who stars reciting them as poem:

**“Let me not to the marriage of true minds**

**Admit impediments. Love is not love**

**Which alters when it alteration finds,**

**Or bends with the remover to remove.**

**O no! it is an ever-fixed mark**

**That looks on tempests and is never shaken;**

**It is the star to every wand'ring bark,**

**Whose worth's unknown, although his height be taken.**

**Love's not Time's fool, though rosy lips and cheeks”**

 

    Hamlets tickles Horatio’s rouge lips and blushed cheeks.

 

**“Within his bending sickle's compass come;**

**Love alters not with his brief hours and weeks,**

**But bears it out even to the edge of doom.**

**If this be error and upon me prov'd,**

**I never writ, nor no man ever lov'd.”**

    Horatio rises quickly to look in Hamlet’s eyes, making the water spill over the border of the tub. He smiled as a lost man who suddenly found the star which would guide him out of the emptiness of the sea. That fear, that hesitation was gone like a shadow touched by fire. Hamlet smiled back at him reassuringly. Hamlet watches him again with those emerald eyes. He wanted Horatio. Oh, how he wanted that man who suffer about the future, whose mind never stopped creating futures like a gypsy reading tarot cards. As a worshiper caressing a statue of a long-forgotten god, Horatio’s touches led Hamlet to voice their love, making the world disappears as if they were underwater.

The rest was silence.

**Author's Note:**

> The "poem" recited by Hamlet is actually Sonnet 116 by Shakespeare


End file.
